End Of The Line
by Babycakes Nast
Summary: People killed, people died, people got infected and in turn, also killed. From a girl to a woman and to a survivor, Peyton is, and will always be, fighting for her life. Some want to kill her and others, use her. OC-centric. Might become Joel/OC if I decide to continue. Rated T for now. Was titled Aftermath.


_This may come as a surprise but I've been writing this little thing here for nearly a week now. It all started after listening continuously to the soundtrack of the game. It may or may not turn into a full story but I just had to write something. It is an OC-centric Two Shot for now. As I said, I don't know if I'll be taking it further. If it does turn into a full story, the OC, I promise, will not be annoying. It will turn into a Joel/OC story if it does but it definitely won't be all romantic and stuff. No time for that in a post-pandemic/apocalyptic world. It will continue into another chapter where she meets Joel and Ellie but after that, I don't know. Might or might not continue it._

_I do not own The Last of Us. Just my OC. _

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**THE LAST OF US**

_END OF THE LINE_

_Aftermath_

It was another day in another house, scavenging for anything useful. A force of habit and necessity. Food was scarce and so were supplies. Houses were nearly empty, other survivors having gone through it before she had. The only things left she'd take because she'd never know if one day they'd become useful. This house had some canned food left, the first thing to have brought a smile on her face in weeks. She'd figured hunting was her best choice seeing as this was the first time she'd found any sort of canned food in nearly a month and probably the last time in a similar amount of time. Hunters made sure to scavenge until houses were nearly empty, obviously leaving nothing else for anyone out there trying to survive. But then, it was better not to try to fight them over supplies because those hunters were ruthless. But it all had to do with survival, trying not to die at the hands, or teeth, of the infected. And not to die at the end of another survivor's gun barrel.

_Surviving, but for what? _She'd ask herself at least once a day, everyday. Her father had told her that no matter what she'd have to find something worth fighting for. That no matter how horrible this world was, there was something worth trying to survive for. To not feel the guilt of surviving if someone died, infected or not. Slaughtered or not. He made her promise to try to survive, for him. She swore to him she would. She then found his very self explanatory excuse for why she found him with a gunshot wound to the head the next day. His sleeve rolled up to reveal the first signs of infection spreading where he'd been bitten. The body still had a warmth to it when she found him, sitting next to it with his hand in hers until he went cold. He'd gone on his own terms, as painful as it was to know. She was twenty-one when it happened, six years after the outbreak. Days later, the quarantine zone in which they lived was ravaged by a horde of infected somehow infiltrating the zone. Three days it took for the infected to rid the zone of more than half of its inhabitants. A total of six days later, they were no more than twenty survivors. A week later they were seven. And then there was her.

During those years she'd done more running than surviving but all of that running turned into what she'd promised her father: fighting for her survival. She would meet with other survivors and learn from them, learn anything she could that would benefit her. And she did. By the age of twenty-five she was a seasoned survivor. She wasn't perfect, far from that but she could take care of herself. She'd made the decision she wouldn't be at the one at the end of someone's gun barrel. Or the teeth of an infected. Most people were at the end of her own barrel. Hunters begging for their lives as they crawled on the floor, looking up at the barrel of her gun. It was either her or them. In the end, it was always them.

The infected, after years of watching them, were now predictable. The Runners were newly infected humans. Able to see, barely, and hear anyone but not able to outrun a non-infected. Some are non-aggressive, the rarer kind, and the others are, well, very aggressive seeing as they are ready to trample humans. In groups they are the worst. Stalkers were…well, stalkers. Hide and ambush was their technique. Physically they looked at like a mix of Runners and Clickers. The latter being the one she despised the most. The Clickers were the type of infected she came in contact with the most, unfortunately. But fortunately for her they were blind, the fungus having grown immensely across the face. She still hated them the most because of the sound they emitted, the clicking. If there was one type of infected she hoped to never meet it was the Bloater. She'd never seen one but according to what she'd heard from other survivors or even hunters, they were a force to be reckoned with. Then there were the spores but she never had to worry about those.

Those were all things she'd learned over the years of learning to survive. She'd always thought there was one type of infected before when she lived in the zone. She'd clearly been somewhat sheltered from the truth. A lot of people had been too.

But out there, outside the quarantine zones, there was no sheltering from the truth. People killed, people died, people got infected and in turn, also killed. It was a vicious circle. But one that couldn't be avoided. It's what they'd have to deal with for god knows how long.

The long ten years from the moment the infection broke out until her twenty-fifth birthday had been years of adjusting, learning and certainly a lot of growing up. In a small amount of years she'd gone from a girl to a woman and was now a survivor. She'd lost hope for a cure a long time ago, not believing the military or the Fireflies could ever find a cure. The promises both made year after year now becoming empty promises of hope.

But she learned that thing could change quickly. One day it could be all about survival and the other about which way was quicker to end your own life. It happened to many. Happened to her too. Only she was still alive.

She'd been twenty-six when it happened, when she was bitten.

And she was still here.

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_Please review. I accept constructive comments and criticism as long as you are respectful. My first language ain't English. It's French, so please be mindful of that. No bashing either. If you don't like, just...just don't read. _

_I know I went with the whole immune thing. But I decided hey, why not. I don't know where this is going. _

_PM me with anything you want to talk about or any suggestions, I'm very nice and love to talk :) _

_Hope you liked it. _


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